Maximum PC

Hi,
I am putting together a Desktop for watching stock market charts.
I will be connecting 12 Monitors ( Dell U2412M x 24 inch, 1920x1200 ) to this desktop.

Mostly I will be using 2 stock applications & couple of Word Docs & some webpages simultaneously.

OS will be Windows -7 ( Ultimate )

I will be using three ATI FirePro 2460 Graphics cards. ( I did a lot of research & chose these Low Profile cards ) AMD has specifically designed these cards for stock market applications & are used by many professionals.

I am not sure but Intel i7 2600 3.4 GHz processor should be enough ?

I am thinking about 8 GB GB DDR3 RAM

I need one DVD-RW

I guess Onboard Sound would be good enough.

Although I don’t have a budget restriction & want to build the best system, I am limited to the parts available where I am located. So you guys need to pick the parts from the following 2 websites. I am importing graphics cards since they are not available here.

http://www.theitdepot.com/
http://www.deltapage.com/

Thank You all.

Where are you located?
The i7 you list is one of the fastest consumer CPUs. For what you want, this is overkill. Play any games? What other apps do you want to run?
You may only need an i3.

Damn... You have very little access to components over there. Just on the motherboards, they are double the cost and very little z68 boards to choose from.

Depending on how much analyzes work you do I'd say get the i5 2500k or stick with the i7 2600k. Alternatively, the AMD x6 is a great cheap alternative. In terms of your computer, are you restricted to the size of the case? Do you plan on adding more than 12 monitors to this computer? What other apps do you plan on running?

I'd say just make sure the motherboard you choose has 3 pcie x16 slots or more. I didn't see a lot to choose from those two sights and if you stay with Intel, only look at the p67 or z68 chipset. Asus seems the most plentiful brands at either locations. 8GB of ram should do you just fine, but since ram is pretty cheap even over in India, I'd say get 16gb.

While I would slap myself silly if I was going to advise someone to spend $240+ for a video card just to support 4 displays each that has next to no power, but it will serve your purpose quite well. Alternatively, you can get cheaper single slot amd eyefinity cards that support 3 displays each, grab one or two pci gpu's for the other displays or even use USB to HDMI converters. But this would be more complicated than getting three simple cards that does all of this without any headaches. Plus they use like 20w.

The AMD 6950 supports 4 displays but these are gaming cards. Technically you can find them in the states for about the same price as the Firepro cards, but out in India, they are close to the $320 mark. They also take up 2 slots and restrict your upgrade path. But you could take some gaming breaks in between your "cornering of the market". hehe If not, stick with the Firepro's.

As for HDD, just grab a cheap 1tb 7200 drive like the Hitachi 7k1000; its about the same price here with it being about $65 at the IT Depot.

I saw the GPUs on Google for 30 USD. Please link where they are on the websites you were looking at. I couldn't find them.
Also, I heard you could daisy chain Displayport monitors. What are the restrictions on that?

where the hell do you find a professional firepro $230 card for 30 bucks?

Thank you guys. Let me answer questions you have.

I don't play any games. I do watch movie video etc though.

I run 2 stock applications + run 2 to 4 word docs + visit 3 to 5 websites, use skype etc.

I do have a Dell XPS 8300 with i-7 & feels good.

I-7 or i5 ?

One commercial company that builds these specialized computers for traders says that even i7 is too slow & they use i7 970 for their 12 monitor setup.

I am not restricted by case size. I have plenty of space if that is what you are asking.

I won't be adding more monitors & I can'tven if I wanted to because I don't know if I can get a motherboard that would have more than 3 PCIe x16 slots that would support more than 3 Video Cards or could I ?

I am also keeping my budget flexible. I want a pretty good system when I am spending so much on Monitors & Video Cards.

Those Video cards I bought from ebay totalling over $1000.00 with shipping cost of $ 150.00 by UPS from Canada.

I can't buy other stuff like motherboard etc from US because of shipping cost of minimum $ 150.00 + 50% customs duty.

So I have to choose from what is available locally.

Now I need to know few things from you guys because I have almost zero knowledge of following components, so if you guys can choose them from those 2 sites I posted, would help out a lot.

(1) Motherboard

I tried to read some but got confused when it came to PCIe x16 slots. They are not straight forward & share or output 4 or 8 etc. So I can't even figure out how many of those are real PCIe x16

(2) Case. Know nothing about them too.

(3) PSU

(4) Cooling system

Thanks

well, if the traders have slowdown on an i7, then go with the i7 920. It will still be a mite slow, but it will do.

^umm.. seriously, wtf you smoking? the i7 2600k smokes the i7 920 and the 970. Don't get confused with the 970x. Stick with the i7 2600k, its half the price of the older 970.

1. Look for P67 or z68 chipset with at least 3 pcie x16 slots. And yes, there are motherboards that have nothing but x16 slots; however they all don't run at the rated x16 speeds, but that doesn't matter since you don't need the bandwidth. Plus they are hella expensive, around $350+ states side and build for gaming. You don't need anything that says SLI/CF ready so just an ordinary mobo with the amount of slots will work.

The cheapest one is the Asus P8Z68 V ATX which is a 12685 Ru, or something like $240. A bit pricey, but it will work.

2. For cases, you don't have a lot of options either. I'd stay with Antec, Cooler Master, NZXT or SilverStone. Just find something that looks good in the mid-tower range, or if you want the space, get a full tower if you need a lot of hard drive slots.

3. For power, you honestly don't need a lot. Those cards only use 20w each and the cpu is about 95w; everything else in the system ill probably add another 50w so you could get away with using a small 350w PSU. I'd say don't get anything bigger than a 500w and stick with good brands like Antec, Cooler Master, Corsair, and Seasonic.

Something like this Antec 450w will work for you and its relatively cheap at 2550 ru or about $50.

4. As for cooling, I'd say just use what you are given. The Intel stock heatsink is pretty decent and the case fans in a decent case will provide adequate air flow. You can always add more fans in a case since most don't provide all the fans. Most tend to be between 80mm and 140mm fans, but just make sure what case you got and what comes with it.

If you want to dabble with Over Clocking, then get the cheap Cooler Master Hyper 212+. Its 2160 ru, which is about $40 and will give you a good amount of headroom for your i7.


And good god on spending over $1000 for those cards! I would have been tempted to just use 6950's for the cheaper price. They maybe bigger badder cards, but you get your money's worth. Anyhow, with the slim firepro's, you can still get regular pci video cards to add to the system if you need more monitors, or use usb-to-hdmi adapters. But there's a certain limit on those (I think 6?).

I'm digging out the comparison now. Magazines at fifty paces?

http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu ... 40+3.20GHz
Okay, I got it wrong. The 980x may be best.

Hi,

Some stupid questions but I want to learn.

Which chipset is better & opinion on P8P67 Pro Vs P8Z8 V motherboards

I like to watch movies & music. Should I go for a sound card ?

How about Hard drive. Many traders use combination of solid state for OS & regular. I don't want to spend a lot on solid state instead regulat fast HDD. So which one ?

I don't mind getting a bigger case not for many HDD but rather more room if I have to fool around in it. I hate crowded cases. Any recommendations ?

PSU. May be 750 W just in case I want to add something down the road ? I do have two 2TB external USB HDD with power that I keep connected all the time & like to have 3 internals.

Yes, those cards are outrageously expensive even in US they are over $240.00, do you know why such a simple card costs so much ?

I was going to go for two ATI Radeon 6870 with eyefinity & 6 mini DPs each but they weren't available here & they have fans & we have plenty of dust so if something goes wrong, I would be in trouble. They also take up 2 slots each.

Its expensive because its a niche item and the fact that its branded as a professional card with AMD's Firepro. I'm surprised its so expensive and why there isn't good cheaper alternatives since its a very weak card is beyond me. It should handle all the usual video stuff fairly well.

As far as a sound card, there's basically Asus Xonar's and Creative X-Fi; that's if you want a discrete sound card with more features. Most onboard sound today is pretty damn good. Most mid range to highend motherboards offer 5.1/7.1 surround sound with optical out. Since your not OC, you shouldn't worry about increased on board noise. Stick with what you get on the mobo first and if you find you'd like to get one, get one later down the road.

Honestly, The p67 and the z68's perform about the same, its just that the z68's are newer and most of them are about the same price. z68's also add on the new Intel SRT ssd cache drive feature which if pretty nifty. It allows you to put a small ssd, up to 64gb, and it'll be a fast cache drive for your normal mechanical master boot record drive. That way, you get the speed of an ssd for your normally used files/os/apps, retain your large C: drive and without spending $$$ on a larger 120+gb ssd.

Personally, since 120gb ssd's have been falling very rapidly, you can easily find a newest gen sata6 drive for under $200 states side; not sure about in India. Then use some 1tb or 2tb drives as your storage and you'd be good for a while. Samsung Spinpoint f3 1tb is the fastest mechanical drives in the 7200 speed right now. I didn't see them listed on those sites, but hitachi is a good alternative. You can save a little bit if you get the slower 5400/5900 green drives, but they are no good in a raid setup.

As for the PSU, 750 is completely overkill by 400w. Like I said before, your system will barely use 200w total.

Any suggestions for RAM ( Brand )

I was going to get 8 GB but being so cheap, it wouldn't hurt to get 12 GB ?

Just for info : Ran into this site that builds those i7-970 systems for traders.

http://www.naplestech.com/shopcart/QS12 ... sional.asp

that's about $1000 over priced.

In terms of brands for ram, Kingston, Corsair, G.Skill, Crucial are all good brands. Stick with 4gb sticks so get 16gb. Make sure you get 1.5v and try to get 9-9-9 timings or lower. 8's would be ideal, but the price increase is hardly to justify the 1-3% increase in performance.

I am lost here.

1.5v ?
9-9-9 timing or lower ?

Something like this:
G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model F3-12800CL9D-8GBXL
Cas Latency: 9
Voltage: 1.5V
Multi-channel Kit: Dual Channel Kit
Timing: 9-9-9-24
ECC: No
Buffered/Registered: Unbuffered
Heat Spreader: Yes

But at your two locations.

So these are ok ?

http://www.theitdepot.com/details-G.ski ... 10666.html

Yes.

I've been watching this thread, it's different and interesting.

You can have more than 12 monitors. If you want to go crazy, there are S1366 boards (the older 9xx i7s) that have up to 7 PCI-E lanes. You could also get Eyefinity-6 cards which support 6 monitors each.

I spent some time poking around the 2 sites you listed, and Theitdepot is actually a pretty decent site. I put together some parts, and I'll explain why I'm using each.

I chose the Asus P8P67 Pro because it has 4 PCI-E x16 slots, which will allow you to add another Firepro if you decide. It's also just an all-around kick-ass board. It's not Z68, but we're not using any Z68 features anyway, and the depot didn't have one with all the thing's we're looking for. We'll drop the i7 2600K into it to have plenty of threads to multitask. We'll use the stock Intel cooler as it's reliable, quiet and free, with plenty of cooling at stock speeds. To feed it, we'll add two G.Skill 8GB PC1600 memory kits. That'll give us 16GB of memory, more than enough for whatever you're doing.

We can put all of that into an Antec 300 case, which I think is a great case with good cooling, but won't look out of place in an office. Jbaz was right about the power requirements for this build, so a nice reliable Corsair Builder 500W PSU will give us just what we need.

For storage, there's a few options. We want something reliable, that if the drive fails, you won't experience any downtime. Fortunately, the motherboard supports RAID 1, which is easy to setup and maintain, and provides an excellent level of redundancy. We could use 2 Deskstar 7Ks to get you 1TB of redundant storage. I would recommend buying a third as an extra drive you can put in if one fails, and of course have an off-site backup plan, but that's beyond the scope of this text. Finally, toss a DVD Burner in it. LG 24x SATA will work.

Lastly, I would do something I don't think I've ever done and recommend Windows 7 Ultimate. The ultimate version will give you the ability to join a domain if you need to, and also the ability to run Windows XP mode, which can be important if you work with a lot of different organizations, many online web tools still require IE7. Lastly, it gives you bitlocker, which will allow you to encrypt your entire drive and your backup drives.

That will give you a reliable, fairly quiet PC that is plenty powerful enough for the most demanding analysis and, paired with 3 of your Firepros, easily able to handle 12 monitors.

Yup.